Thankful Thursday

I'm thankful that I can still believe in His faithfulness

A Hard Day

Wordless Wednesday

Life's Not Fair, but God is Good

I won't get the official news until tomorrow, but we aren't pregnant. I took my first test 9dp3dt(I also took one 10dp3dt and 11dp3dt). I took the most sensitive test(first response...the one that gave me a false positive back in December the morning my beta was 12). I knew then that it was over. It was pretty sad. I laid in bed and held the picture of our babies and cried and Rob came into the room and crawled in bed with me and said, "you took a test?". I said yes. We just laid there for a long time. At that moment, as sad as I was, I trusted God's plans more than I ever have. I can't explain that except that God is working in our lives through all of this pain. It doesn't take away the sadness, but it makes the hope stronger.

I thought the title of this post was fitting since this was Norm's quote(our great family friend, who passed away April 1st of this year) and tomorrow would have been her birthday(the day we get the official news). This news doesn't change who God is. Believe me I could go on and on about people that keep having babies and don't have custody of any of them or people who beat their kids to death and I DO ask God about that...why do you keep giving them babies? That's not fair! But God reminds me that He is Good and has great plans for our lives and just to trust him. So I think I'll focus on that instead. God knew the outcome of this IVF cycle long ago and no matter how shaken I am by this, He's not shaken!(one of my favorite songs right now by Phil Stacy-You're not shaken)

my fav part of that song....

"I am trembling in the darkness of my own fear
All the questions with no answers
So grip me while I’m here
And I may never know why
Oh I may not understand
But I will lift up my eyes,
and trust this is Your plan"

/Chorus/
When every little thing that I dream of being just slips away like water through my hands
And when it seems the walls from my beliefs come crashing down like they’re all made of sand
I won’t, let go of You now
because I know, oh, You’re not shaken

Thanks for all of your prayers throughout the process of IVF cycle#1. Yes I said #1...we might actually try this again, although right now I think we will just take a break. We have to for financial reasons anyway. Please continue to pray for God to show us His plans. He might have plans for us to adopt or try this again or even something else to bring us our baby.

What is happening for the next few days...hopefully

5dpt.. Implantation begins,as the blastocyst begins to bury in the lining

6dpt.. Implantation process continues and morula buries deeper in the lining

7dpt.. Morula is completely implanted in the lining and has placenta cells &
fetal cells

Well I am a little bummed today. I am just not feeling it. I know I'll be ok if it doesn't work but it will suck too. Please keep praying that our little ones will make their homes in there for the next 9 months. I probably won't update the blog anymore for a couple of weeks. I think I am just going to take a break. The encouragement from everyone is so appreciated and it helps so much but I think I would be better off staying away from some of the other blogs I find and the Internet too. Your encouragement and prayers mean so much to me. Thank you so so so much! We don't want to share our testing date because if it would be positive we want to share that with our families first and if it is negative we just want some time to deal with that alone I think. Love you all!

Jeremiah 29:11 (New International Version)

¹¹ For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

4dp3dt-Calling all you prayer warriors!

So what should be going on in there today???.......

4dpt.. Blastocyst attaches to a site on the uterine lining

ATTACH MY LIL LUVBUGS!!!!!

Hatch little chickies Hatch!

On day 3 after a 3 day transfer(3dp3dt-3days past 3day transfer) the blastocysts should be hatching out of the outer shell. My shell was thick according to the embryologist so they did what is called assisted hatching where they make a small hole in the outer layer to help with the hatching process. Please pray for our little ones to be able to hatch out of their shells today!!! Go little chickies Go! You can do it!!

Here's a pic of the assisted hatching procedure. The tool on the left is just to hold the embryo. The needle on the right is making a small hole in the outer shell.

Survival

Ok, I need some tips on how to survive the wait to find out if this IVF cycle worked. I have been doing pretty well, but I am starting to feel a little crazy already!! Anyone have any advice??

Transfer Complete

We transferred a...

4 cell(it's a little behind)

7 cell (grade 2+)

8 cell (grade 4)

They are graded on a scale of 0-4 with 4 being the best.

Here are our sweet babies

The little white dot is them being put into my uterus(their home:))

Please pray that they latch on and make themselves at home!

Thanks for all of the prayers!

Update

First of all thanks so much for the prayers and all of the comments on my last post! This is so exciting and feels so awesome to have so much support and encouragement! I just wanted to let everyone know our ET is Friday morning at 6:45!! Early but that's OK! I can't wait to see how my babies are doing!!

Petrie, Ducky and Spike

Our friend, Andrew, told us the other day that if we get pregnant and have a boy, he thinks we should name him petri(like petri dish). So then I thought of Petrie from the land before time and I was like, we definitely need to name our embryos. So we officially have 3 embryos!! Our little babies! I am in love already!!! Petrie, Ducky and Spike(all land before time characters)! Thank you so much for your prayers!!! PTL!!! I was crying and jumping up and down!! My sister got to witness it all!!! She said she wishes she would've videoed it for Rob!..LOL! Dr. S, the embryologist said that the nurses will call me this afternoon to set up my transfer for friday! We are doing a 3 day transfer! They won't look at the little ones tomorrow but will look at them before the transfer on Friday and let us know how they look!! Oh I am flying high right now!! Now we'll just wait and see if they divide and grow like they should and of course PRAY! Thank you God! I am so excited!!!

Egg Retrieval

The ER went well today. I was so nervous while we were waiting. They were so busy it was like an assembly line for ER today. At about 8:30, Dr. J(best Dr. in the world) came and got me and wheeled me back to the OR. When we got there, he was like, "ok let's get this done right this time." I just love him! I also had a nurse that I used to work with at Riley as one of my nurses. She was really sweet and as her and Dr. J where putting my legs up into the stirrups, I was luckily drifting off to sleep. So I didn't have too much time to think about the fact that someone from work was all down in my business;). For all of you Riley girls reading this, it was Stacey M. from Mod 6. Thank you everyone for your encouraging words over the last few days and all of the prayers that were being said for us this morning. We appreciate it so much...and now we just wait for the fertilization report in the AM. I am pretty sleepy so hopefully I'll sleep the day away so it will go by fast!!. Oh yeah...Dr. J gave Rob a thumbs up, when he brought me back to my recovery room(i was still out of it) and said that he got 5 good eggs and seemed to be happy with that. We are too! Keep praying that our little eggs and spermies turn into embies...healthy embies! :) Thanks!

Us "patiently" waiting for our turn:)

Me a little out of it(or a lot.lol.wow!)...saying we got 5!!

Retrieval Eve

So I should be in bed right now since I need to get up at about 5:00am, but I am just so anxious/excited. I have been reading this book the last couple days that my SIL just sent me in the mail. The name of it is "The Red Sea Rules"-10 God given strategies for difficult times. I haven't gotten very far into it yet but I am loving it and it is just what I need. Especially during these next couple of weeks. The two things that have really helped me so far are, "The same God who led you in will lead you out"....and Red Sea Rule #1, "Realize that God means for you to be where you are." I guess these things have given me so much comfort over the last couple of days because I know that God has my best interests in mind and that He has a perfect plan for our lives. So the fact that He has brought us here means that there is a reason for it(He means for us to be here), and He will eventually lead us out. I don't know if this will be it, but it could be it and I still don't know what His perfect plans are but I am choosing to trust in His plans for our lives. I hope beyond all hope that this is it, but if it's not, I will be OK.

God, I am so excited about tomorrow. I want to believe that this will be it, but I also know that i don't want something that isn't in your timing. I am going to continue to hope that we will be blessed with a baby from this IVF cycle. But if we aren't, I know that we will be ok because of who you are and your perfect plans for our lives. I just pray that our little eggs will be mature and that fertilization will occur. Please give us peace and help us find our strength in you throughout this process. In Jesus name, Amen

Trigger Time

Today we had a day of celebrating toddler birthdays! It was lots of fun! Katie is turning 3 and had a Little Mermaid party! And Noura turned 2 on Saturday and celebrated with a Mickey Mouse theme!!

Katie pausing to pose for a pic

Noura checking out the water before the party began

Noura thoroughly enjoying her bday party!

Well Rob just gave me my last injections of the cycle. It is so exciting and stressful all at the same time! I am just ready for Tuesday to be here...actually I am ready for Wednesday so we can find out the fertilization report!

Another Follicle Update

So I went in for another US this morning. Everything looked good. I think I had 9 or 10 follicles with only a few not quite big enough. The nurse called me this afternoon and said that Dr. J wants me to take my Bravelle and Menopur one more time in the morning and then tomorrow night at 8pm I will trigger. Monday I have pre-op labs and an appt. and then Tuesday morning at 8am will be our retrieval!! This is so exciting! Rob gave me my last dose of Lupron tonight. He likes to be involved in this process as much as he can so he gives me my lupron at night and then he usually is still in bed when I do the shots in the mornings, so I do those. I'll leave you with a pic of me getting my last lupron shot!!! This is so exciting!!

Follicles

Well I went in for my second ultrasound today and I have 7 follicles that are either ready or close to ready to be "retrieved"! Dr. J wants me to take one more day of meds, come in for another ultrasound in the morning and then I will probably trigger tomorrow night and go in for ER on Monday! Wow this is going so fast! I am mostly staying positive and am excited to see what next week brings. I have a specific prayer request that might sound silly but it is really important to me. There is a "disclaimer" on our paperwork that says it could be either Dr. J or his partner Dr. M who does the ER and ET, so please pray that Dr. J will do ours. I know there are a lot of IVF cycles going on right now in his office and I so want him to be the one to do it. I just know him and really like him and he has been the one that has been through all of this with us. So please pray for that and that my follicles would continue to do what they need to do and that Dr. J will get the 3 mature eggs that we need!

Thankfulness

I just want to thank everyone that sent me words of encouragement yesterday! It means so much to me and helps me a lot! I had someone at work pretty much making fun of me yesterday. She was saying, "you don't even know those people on those blogs, but you act like they're your friends." I was so hurt by that! You are all friends to me! It is so awesome to have people going through the same things! We are able to encourage each other and it means so much to me. Even though we haven't ever met in person, I feel like we have such a special bond because of the infertility journey we share! Thanks so much to all my blogger friends!!!...and of course to all of my friends(that i have met in person;)) that read my blog! You are all so special to me!

I am scared

I am having a rough time today. I was doing so well and feeling so positive and then last night I was jumping from blog to blog reading about different IVF stories and I just got so scared about this not working. I started reading about 3day transfers vs 5day transfers and wondering what ours will be and if our embryos will thrive for those 3-5 days or will they not make it?!? Will this work and I will get to be a mommy or will it not and we will have to wait another year to try again??...I am so scared and I know fear is not from God, so I just keep praying for peace but i just can't shake it. I want to relax and stay positive. Anyone have any advice or special verses that helped you get through this time or if you haven't gone through this just any special verses that you think might help. I need something that I can cling to, because I can tell this is going to be a long month...I just want to stay positive and trust God for His plans. Please pray for this for me! Thanks!

Let's get this thing started!!

My meds for the next 6 days!!!

Since it's Thursday I thought I would do a little "Thankful Thursday" post...

I am thankful for...

Jesus

My Husband

My Family

Infertility(don't get me wrong...I am ready for it to be over, but it has refined me so much in the last two years and as painful as that can be, it is a great thing!)

True Friends

My meds arriving today:)

My wonderful Dr., Dr. J

Mary

My Job

Mug Root Beer and....

Sushi

These are just a few of the wonderful blessings in my life!